Many people exercise to improve their health and/or physique, and often, such exercise includes lifting weights. Lifting weights can be done with the aid of a machine, such as a nautilus and/or universal gym; or with the aid of a bar that is free—not connected to or confined by a machine—that one grasps and moves relative to a portion of one's body, such as one's chest for a bench press. To lift the desired weight for a desired number of repetitions, one or more weights can be releasably attached to the bar. Exercises that include moving the free bar, also known as a press bar (20 in FIGS. 1A-1C), with or without an attached weight 22 (two shown attached to a bar 20) are commonly referred to as free-weight exercises. Each of the three figures, FIGS. 1A-1C, respectively shows an example of three common free-weight exercises—the bench press, military press, and squat.
Many exercise programs include free-weight exercises because one uses more muscles in one's arms, back and legs during the lifting to stabilize the bar 20 than one uses when lifting with a nautilus (not shown) and/or universal gym (not shown). Unfortunately, in these and other free-weight exercises, pushing against the press bar 20 to lift or hold one or more weights can cause pain in and/or damage one's wrists, elbows, shoulders and/or back because grasping the press bar 20 with both hands as show in FIGS. 1A-1C causes the wrist, elbow, and shoulder of each arm to not be aligned in an anatomically proper alignment for pushing. An anatomically proper alignment for pushing against the press bar includes positioning the elbow closer to the body to keep the humerus, clavical and scapula bones (not shown) and their corresponding muscles, tendons and ligaments (not shown) that comprise the shoulder in an alignment that provides optimal blood flow and power. The anatomically proper alignment also includes positioning each hand so that it opens toward the other hand.
In addition to improper anatomical alignment of one's arm, pushing against the press bar 20 to lift a large amount of weight can be difficult because the press bar and weight can be difficult to stabilize within one's grip. Pushing against the press bar 20 at a position that is level with or below the bar and weight's center of gravity urges the press bar 20 to rotate in one's grip, and/or roll over one's wrist. The center of gravity is the point at which the entire weight of the press bar 20 and any attached weights 22 may be considered as concentrated so that if supported at this point the press bar 20 and attached weights 22 would remain in equilibrium in any position. To prevent the rotation and/or rolling, one tightly grips the press bar 20 and focuses on adjusting the direction of one's push. Thus, the conventional press bar can be difficult to hold onto during a free-weight exercise.